It's LITERATURE! (Smutty literature). [tag: Jackson]

When Cleo had thought to get more books for her downtime, she hadn't thought the store's selection would be quite so extensive. Once she got to her preferred genre, she almost wept at the amount of new books there were to be read. She wondered if she had enough space under her bed...

"Oh! Lowlander, part four!" She gasped, reaching for the heavy hard back. The Augur and Lily had just been betrothed to save Lily from her arranged marriage with a whiny duke's son, and the last book had ended with the Augur's genuine confession of love to her. She settled down in the romance aisle, eagerly flipping through the pages. Maybe this time would show whether Lily loved him back! And maybe the duke's son getting shoved off a cliff, too. That would make it better.

Jackson doesn't 'read for leisure'. He doesn't read fiction, nonfiction, science fiction, medieval fiction, magazines, brochures, pamphlets, manuals; he just, doesn't read. If he is reading, it's for a complete applicable reason for whatever he's there for. Well why is he in a bookstore? He honestly can't say for sure himself. And he's fully prepared to leave when he passes a bookshelf until he spotted a familiar figure bulging her eyes into a book. His eyes flickered to the sign. Romance. Jackson snickered quietly. How cliché. Something like this could not go without acknowledgement, it would be an injustice. Jackson walked up beside her, peering over her shoulder as he sipped from his bottled tea. "People get paid to write that stuff?" He scoffed, smirking mischievously at her.

'The Augur gingerly kneaded the soreness from her back, working down at an agonizing pace, his hands leaving fire in their wa--' Cleo jumped when she heard him. She snapped her book close, eyes wide in alarm. Great, it was that asshole. And he just had to interrupt her peaceful reading when things were getting good! She stood up, glaring at him as she clutched the book to her chest. "Yes, they do. Some of them get paid fabulously." She said calmly. "There's an audience for everything, and publishers capitalize on that."

"Some of them get paid fabulously." Jackson mimicked, rolling his eyes and emphasizing his case with his hands and body movement. He grinned at her. "You seem to feel very strongly about 'augurs' massaging at an agonizing pace." He held his hands up in surrender and whistled. "Yeah, I bet they do. They have people like you squealing at the release of the next..." Jackson waved his hand dismissively, turning away from her and heading down the aisle. "What's the word? Smut." He smirked over his shoulder, "You don't have anyone fulfilling your needs, Cleo?..Well that's actually not a shock." He teased.

"It's romance!" Cleo insisted. "The...relations are just one part of it!" She was just as invested in the emotional side of things, too. Maybe even more. She was tempted to throw the book at him, but that would just damage it. It was too precious to risk it.

"If it was a choice between taking a vow of celibacy or someone like you, I'd put on a freaking chastity belt!" She said instead, turning back to the shelves to look for something else. She'd just buy whatever and get back to her room. "And it's not always about sex, anyways..." she muttered.

"Of course it is, princess." Jackson replie offhandedly. She was not making her case well at all. She couldn’t have fooled a frail old lady who was losing her hearing. That was still a nice thing to hear, Cleo running her mouth to defend her precious smutty novels. Jackson scowled. "Whatever you want to call it, it’s all to sappy for me anyways. I don’t do the Notebook type stuff, if ya couldn’t already tell." Jackson had developed intimacy issues with his time in the detention center, and in general with his father. He wasn’t exactly keen on deep emotions. When it came to girls, he kind of forgot about the emotional part. Jackson turned on his heels. "Aw, you wouldn’t be with 'someone like me'? That hurts." It sort of did actually. "Yeah? What guy have you been with that don’t want some sex? It inhuman male nature."

Cleo rolled her eyes. "Yeah, anyone with a brain cell could figure out you aren't about emotional connections." She told him. And as if Lowlander was sappy. It wasn't some vanilla Disney shit.

"You're assuming everyone's like you." She said, wagging her finger at him with a smirk. "Besides, my family has expectations and I had to live up to them. Any boy who pushed too much learned to regret it." Granted, her sister had been a little more liberal when it came to her dates than their parents, but not by much.

"Is that a problem? Maybe I just like a good fuck and that’s all. Is that so bad?" Jackson was never the romantic type anyway, and it wasn’t as if he's had a lot of time to go out of his way to be the greatest boyfriend in existence. Of course he could, but he chose not to. "It’s all relative anyway." He commented offhandedly. "Your family? So you’re a big deal from where ever you're from..I guess." Jackson couldn’t care less. She’s here now. "Well it’s just you here, and judging from our last meeting, I’d say you've got this pretty under control." He winked at her.

Cleo shook her head. "Well, no, not really. Everyone's different." But that was entirely her point. Her grip tightened when she was inadvertently reminded her of her situation on the island: no family, horribly friendless, still more kinks in her control to work out... Her eyes and cheeks started burning but she answered calmly as she grabbed another book, "I was, by proxy."

Cleo glared at him. "Like you were ever on it." She hissed. Of all the assholes she could've run into, it had to be the king. She wondered if he was just naturally cruel or what. "And you're getting on my nerves. There's a difference." She added, raising her chin.

Jackson gives Cleo a saddened pouting face. Of course he was at least a bit hurt by that. "'s a pity, you know? You really would be a great lay I bet." He said, walking past. "And you're probably still a virgin." He murmured in her as he passed, plucking another lame novel from the shelf. "They seem pretty indifferent to me." He raised the book, "You read more stuff like this?"

Cleo rolled her eyes. "I'm not a freaking sex doll." She told him as he walked by. Her eyes widened when he guessed she was inexperienced, but narrowed when he started mocking her taste again. "Yes, I do." She said, putting her free hand on her hip. "My money, my choice."

Why was he acting like they were scum? Cause they wrote a few lines about someone falling in love? He didn't have to like it, but he didn't have to tear down someone who did. "Why are you even in here anyways? Is giving unsolicited reviews just your thing?"

"I've never experienced the lonely interaction of sex with a sex doll, but I'm sure that it's definitely not any better than masturbating." He commented, "No one said you had to invest yourself into anything else." Jackson pointed out. "I just assumed it would be designer versions of a training suit, or something." He stuffed the book back into place. "I wasn't giving you a review, you were simply mistaking my humor. You get offended quite easily...and it's fun to watch, honestly."